Successive narrow strips of white and black fur, with very
short hair, compose this trimming, and the lower edge is finished with
fringe made of thin skin, which is quite ornamental in effect. It also
aids in keeping out the wind, and is, therefore, useful as well. The
outside coat is sometimes surrounded with a border of white fur, with
the fringe attached of longer hair than that upon the inner coat. Some
of the belles, and indeed some of the women whose beauty is a thing of
the past, wear a breastplate of beadwork, which is further decorated
with a fringe of reindeer teeth that has a most ghastly effect--they
look so much like human teeth. The style of costume differs but little
among the various tribes of North America; but in any part of the
country the labor of producing the clothing is the same, and if a man
would dress well he must work hard--he cannot order his suit from a
confiding tailor. It has its advantages and disadvantages. He has no
tailor's bills to avoid the payment of, but he must depend upon himself
and a loving and skilful wife.
CHAPTER X.
OVER MELTING SNOWS.
We were now on the march from Cape Felix. Lieutenant Schwatka had kept
about a mile east of Frank and Henry, who walked along the coast, and I
about a mile and a half east of Lieutenant Schwatka. When about a mile
and a half above our old camp at Wall Bay, he found a cairn very
similar in construction to the one he found inland from Cape Felix.
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